Untitled Ace Atkins 2

<p><b>'A comic thriller which reads like a mash-up of Elmore Leonard and The Goonies'<i> The Times</i>, Book of the Month</b><br><br><b>'This 80s-set </b><b>yarn mixes fact </b><b>and fiction in a </b><b>winning comedy </b><b>thriller. It's </b><b>totally ace' <i>The Sun</i></b><br><br><b>It's 1985, what will soon become known at "The Year of the Spy," and fourteen-year-old Peter Bennett is convinced his mom's new boyfriend is a Russian agent. </b><br><br>"Gary" isn't in the phone book, has an unidentifiable European accent, and keeps a gun in the glove box of his convertible Porsche. Peter thinks Gary only wants to get close to his mom because she works at Scientific Atlanta, a lab with big government contracts. But who is going to believe him? He's just a kid into BMX and MTV.<br><br>But after another woman who works at the lab is killed, Peter recruits an unlikely pair of allies - a has-been pulp writer named Dennis Hotchner and his drag performer buddy and heavy, Jackie Demure. Both soon become the target of an unhinged Russian hitman (<i>is it Gary? Maybe!</i>) with a serious Phil Collins obsession.<br><br>Meanwhile, Sylvia Weaver, a young, Black FBI agent, investigates Scientific Atlanta in the wake of the employee's murder and discovers a nest of Russian spies. Little does she know her investigation is being thwarted by a seriously compromised colleague in Washington, D.C., who is in league with a lovesick, hypochondriac KGB defector who is playing both sides of the Cold War to his benefit.<br><br>As Ronald Reagan and Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev prepare for a historic nuclear summit in Geneva, what happens in Atlanta might change the course of the Cold War, the 20th Century, and Peter Bennett's freshman year of high school.<br><br><b>'Brilliantly plotted, with a nice streak of black comedy, a thoroughly enjoyable spy novel' <i>Mail on Sunday</i>, Best New Fiction</b></p>